Legally, I'm a single mother, though I have a wonderful and supportive boyfriend. We've been dating for 15/16 months now, have talked about getting engaged and marrying after I finish Uni, and we want to plan a life together. He loves my son to bits and seems to be the only one supporting me at the moment. I'm at Uni full-time, but Uni has finished for the year. I work part-time and am trying to get more hours because my car died last week, and I don't have the savings for a new one so I'm currently without transport. Thankfully work is an easy 30min bus ride and childcare is a 10 min walk away.
Because I'm a Uni student I can't afford to move out of home, and my parents said they'd happily have me home until I graduate and buy a house, but I'm starting to struggle. My dad once told me after an argument that if I didn't want to be here then I should think about finding somewhere else to live. My mother is starting to tell me how to parent my son and has even gone as far as to tell me I'm wrong. Call me naive about being a first time mom, but I've taken what my parents did and picked what I liked and discarded what I don't like. I will choose how I parent my son and I do not appreciate being told I'm wrong when I believe I'm doing what's best for him.
My son is in desperate need of speech therapy. His pronunciation is shocking and although he's been on the waiting list for 6 months apparently he needs to wait until May/June next year. I sometimes struggle to understand him under calm circumstances but in the past couple of months my son has been throwing really bad tantrums. In a good mood he will just drop to his knees and sulk. In a bad mood, as soon as he doesn't get his way or something he wants, he will start screaming and hitting things and throwing things. He has never been physical with me, the worst is screaming and hitting objects/furniture. But the tantrums are getting worse. We have to asses if he's in a good mood before we can go shopping/to dinner/to friends' houses.
I've had issues with anger problems in the past, especially when I was in the abusive relationship and defended myself by attacking back. I want to state first that I've never abused my son. I've smacked the back of his hand or his bum (which is protected by nappy) and sometimes I have to physically lift him and move him if he's throwing a tantrum, but I've never thrown him or beaten him. But the tantrums over the past few months have ended up with me screaming at him in the middle of the night because he won't tell me what's wrong and he won't speak. I've wanted to leave him scream all night and turn off the monitor. I've wanted to shake him to shut him up. I've wanted to punch the wall to get my frustration out. I've had to close the door and walk away just to calm myself down so I don't do anything I regret. It's really scaring me. And what's worse is my parents aren't supporting me.
My mom just gives me disapproving looks and tells me to do it her way. She says that I should try and talk to him and help him understand, but it hasn't worked. When he first started throwing tantrums I tried talking to him. Didn't work. Then I tried leaving him to scream for 5 mins then going and talking to him. Didn't work. He'd think I was coming to give him what he wanted and when I said no again the tantrum would start all over again. So now I'm trying to just let him scream until he stops and then when he finishes go and talk to him about whatever was wrong and, if he were naughty, why he had ended up on the stairs. The stairs is a new thing as well, I'm adopting the Supernanny 'naughty step' thing so if he is naughty he sits on the stairs for 5 mins. If he starts screaming then he has to stop before he can come off.
The first tantrum where I let him scream lasted an hour. He screamed for an hour before stopping. One last week lasted 20 mins. One on Monday lasted 10. So I think it's working. But on Monday my mom told me she thought I was doing the wrong thing and she ended up leaving the room because me ignoring him was upsetting her. my brother (15) yells at me to 'fix' him. That really upsets me. All up I feel like I have no support and I can't implement my own parenting style when my parents and brother are always telling me what to do, and then go behind my back and try and soothe my son, which just undoes everything.
I can't afford to move out of home. I don't want my parents telling my how to raise my son, and then going behind my back when they don't agree with my ways. I don't want to struggle and stress out with every tantrum. Can someone please help me?
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